


I Never Hated You

by Ancrath



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Blood, Brotp, Hurt Keith (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sheith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 12:28:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13717701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ancrath/pseuds/Ancrath





	I Never Hated You

> "Come on, come on."

Lance smacked the side of his helmet as if it would make the communicator miraculously revive. He stared at the blank visor in his hands, hoping, begging that he wasn't alone here.

 _"Please,"_ he fiddled the switch one last time. Nothing.

He groaned in frustration and let his aching body slump into the chair as he chucked his busted helmet into the corner. It landed with a loud clang and he buried his face in his hands. A second after the helmet settled on the floor, familiar static erupted from the earpiece. 

 _"Come i-"_ Lance's head shot up. _"-ance, Keith -- ome in."_ Shiro. 

Lance hurried to his feet, his left leg briefly buckling underneath him, and scrambled to reply. "Shiro! Shiro, I'm here! Can you hear me?!"

Static.

He clutched the helmet in his hands once more, but this time with a delicate desperation. More static.

"No, please..." 

_"Lance!"_

"Pidge!" Tears welled up in his eyes. His face felt dirty, as if his skin was made of dust. 

_"We can hear you! Shiro's comm couldn't go through. Where are you?"_

"I..." He looked around and suddenly felt overwhelmed. The screen was dark, the controls dead. "Hold on, let me take a look around."

_"Please be careful. I can't find you on my tracker so I don't know how toxic the air is."_

Lance fixed the helmet onto his head and activated the air lock. Red was completely shut down and forcing his way out proved to be difficult. His body  _hurt_. 

For a moment, everything was too bright, but as his eyes adjusted to the light he managed to breathe in a sigh of relief, but a pang of nostalgia immediately gripped his heart.

"It... it looks like Earth." 

The trees looked like oaks. He heard chirping, like birds, and as the tiny, winged creatures flicked back and forth across his vision, he couldn't see any difference. Sunlight glistened on sweet, long grass. Flowers were scattered at the bases of trees and rocks. Red was in a meadow, and the surrounding forest looked nothing but friendly and safe.

There was no sign of any human life, or anything similar. 

"Guys, I... am I on Earth?" He felt small.

A brief moment before, _"That can't be possible."_ He could hear Pidge typing.  _"We're light years away. I'm sorry, Lance. Just stay there, we'll find you. Is Keith with you?"_

Keith. The name startled him out of what could only be a dream. This can't be Earth. He slowly turned in a circle, analysing the horizon. The meadow stretched out behind Red, leading off to too-familiar mountains. There was a river, too. 

"I don't see anything. I need a better look, though. Are you sure he landed near me?"

 _"--was shot down with you,"_ Shiro's voice reappeared.  _"I saw him go down. His ship..."_

 _"I'm sure he's as okay as Lance is,"_ Pidge broke the silence after Shiro trailed off. He sounded dazed, even lost. Lance didn't think he had ever heard that tone from Shiro. 

Climbing to the top of Red took longer than he anticipated, but when Lance reached the top, the view it gave him showed an endless expanse of nature.  _Is this what Earth would look like if we were never there?_

"Where is Hunk?" Lance asked with worry laced in his voice. 

 _"I have contact with him_ ," Pidge explained.  _"Only me, though. He's not within range of you or Shiro, but I've got an estimate of his location. Just perfecting the coordinates. None of us can reach Allura, the castle, or Keith. His ship doesn't have the same connection as the lions, but I'm hoping he's near enough to you, Lance."_

The river sounded, looked,  _moved_ like real water. He carefully watched the flow all the way to the base of the mountains, where-

"There."

 _"What?"_ Shiro's voice sparked. 

"I think I found Keith." Lance's heart nearly skipped a beat. "There's a trail of smoke. It looks a few miles away." He paused. "I can't make it there on foot."

 _"Are you hurt?"_ Lance didn't question the way Pidge took leadership. If anything, he cherished her ability to stay clear and logical. 

"I think a little. Nothing hurts specifically, just... I feel like I got beat up."

 _"You_ did _get shot down, buddy,"_ Pidge reminded him.  _"How is Red?"_

He looked down at the Lion below him. "Not active."

_"Something is cutting off my connection with her. If you can reactivate her, I think that'll give me a better chance of locking in on you."_

"Where are you, Shiro?"

He hard a sniff from Shiro's comm. Lance imagined his nose was bleeding.  _"I think I'm above the planet Lance is on. He's right. Even from here, it looks just like Earth."_

For a few heartbeats, all three of them were silent. Maybe Hunk was talking to Pidge.

 _"But it's... it's not, right?"_ Pidge finally asked.

 _"No,"_ Shiro responded.  _"The continents don't look the same. And there's more water."_

Lance didn't know if he was relieved or crushed. 

Back in the cockpit of his Lion, he assessed the damage to Red's controls. It didn't look like anything was beyond fixing. The control panel itself was actually untouched, but the screen had a massive crack across it. Lance wondered how dangerous that would become if he was able to get back into space. 

With the help of Pidge's instructions in his ear, Lance got to work. Red must have taken a hit that jarred her system. A chuckle in the back of his mind hoped it would be just like shaking his helmet the right way to get it to work again. 

The controls came back one by one over a span of time too long for Lance's nerves. Red's communication within nearby spacecraft was the third thing to be successfully restored, but before Lance could send out a signal, Pidge hesitated.

_"What if it reaches Galra instead?”_

"I'll have to take that chance." For the sake of his growing anxiety. For Shiro's sanity. For Keith. 

Lance flipped the switch and held his breath.

"This is Lance. Keith, come in."

Nothing.

"Keith, please come in. This is Lance. I think I'm near your location. Keith, please answer."

 _"L-nce,"_ a whispered voice within the static.  _"Lan--"_

"Keith! Keith, is that you?" He heard noise from Pidge and Shiro after his query and silently wished they would be quiet. He could barely hear Keith's comm.

 _"Lance,"_ his voice was slightly stronger now.  _"Can you hear me?"_

Lance couldn't hold back his smile, nor the new wetness in his eyes. "I hear you, buddy. I'm coming to get you."

 _"There's grass."_ Keith's voice sounded raspy. 

"Don't get your hopes up, Mullet. It's not Earth." He continued to flip controls, frantically trying to get Red up faster. He could tell Pidge and Shiro were listening to his side of the conversation, Keith's communication still being blocked from them. 

 _"Mountains_ _,"_ Keith continued, quietly this time. 

Lance's body stilled in that moment. "Keith, are you hurt?"

_"Yes."_

The former red paladin's confession stopped Lance's heart mid-beat and he found he couldn't move. He had seen Keith take hits that could take down beasts, yet the young man would never let anyone but Shiro past his walls, let alone admit he was in pain.

 _"Lance, what did he say?"_ Shiro prodded.

"Pidge, please get Red up faster."

 _"Lance,"_ Shiro pleaded, but Pidge's instructions overtook his voice. He assured her he was listening as he resumed his conversation.

"Keith, just hang on buddy, I'm going to be there soon, I promise."

_"Promise?"_

"Promise, Mullet. Keep talking to me."

_"You want to talk to me?"_

"Yeah, of course I do. It's my job to keep you alive, now. Can't let you go die on me! That would be a total inconvenience." Each time a new light reappeared on the panel, Lance's eyes grew wider with excitement. 

 _"Oh."_ Lance heard wracking coughs.

"Where are you hurt?" Just as Lance finished his question, Red roared to life. Her limbs creaked as she stood and Lance had to grab hold of his seat to stay steady. He felt like a used-up punching bag. "Keith, where are you hurt?" he asked again when he didn't hear a response. 

 _"...too much,"_ the raspy voice replied.

"Stay with me, Samurai. I'm on my way."

He let Red stay close to the ground, afraid that if he flew too high, the screen would crack more under the pressure of the atmosphere. He was playing a dangerous game. 

The trail of smoke slowly came into focus. Sure enough, the Galra fighter Keith had stolen lay at the root, small flames licking at the back of the ship. How long had it been burning?

Red landed with a growl. As Lance shot out of his seat, a sudden wave of exhaustion engulfed him. His body wasted no effort in telling him how hard Red hit the planet. An intrusive thought told him that the crack in Red's screen was from himself.

Halfway across the distance between Red and Keith's fallen ship, both of Lance's legs buckled, and this time it wasn't as easy to get up. 

"I'm at Keith's location," he relayed into his comm. Shiro told him to hurry, please hurry. 

The flames didn't look horribly threatening. He darkly figured that if the ship was going to explode it would have already.

Finding his way in was more than complicated, but he willed his shaking hands to work. He pulled falling scraps away, piece by piece, and finally crawled in. The entire cockpit was engulfed in smoke. Some trailed out the pathway Lance had created. Grime seemed to latch onto Lance's suit, staining the white of his armor. 

Two Galran foot soldiers lay motionless on the floor, one with a blast through the neck and the other with Keith's knife stuck through the skull. Lying next to the pilot's seat, limp on the floor, lay Keith. 

 _Too much_ , Keith had said. It was clear, now, and he had been right. There was too much blood. 

 _"I've found your coordinates, Lance. Shiro is coming to you_ _."_ Lance barely heard her, didn't make a move to acknowledge either of them.

"Keith!" He let his knees drop him, his hands hovering above Keith's shoulder, afraid that if he made contact Keith would crumble away like ash. "I'm here, Mullet. Remember, you can't die on me."

Dark lashes fluttered under even darker hair. Keith managed to reach out his hand, only slightly, but enough to brush against Lance's leg. A whimper escaped his lips and his body barely had the energy to tremble. 

"Promised," Keith whispered.

"Yeah, buddy, I promised, didn't I?" Lance finally grasped Keith's face in his hands, gently, his thumb tracing over grime, blood, and tears. "I'm here, I'm here." 

"I'm sorry," Keith choked.

"Let's get you out of here," Lance decided as Keith's breath caught in his lungs. His body protested, but he managed to hook his arms around Keith's torso, and lifted. Keith shrieked, and it terrified Lance into nearly dropping him. 

"Come on," Lance begged. "It'll be quick, come on." He lifted again and could hear the shout that Keith bit down, but he kept going. He pulled the former paladin past the dead soldiers, pausing only to pocket Keith's knife. 

By the time he had gotten them both outside, Keith's consciousness had nearly faded completely. Lance dragged him as far away from the burning as he could until his body gave out. He couldn't go any farther. He couldn't get both of them back to Red together. He felt like he was ripping at the seams. 

"Hey," Lance carefully roused his teammate. "Stay with me, stay with me." Pleading. 

When Keith's awareness came back to him, he immediately gulped in the fresh air, but the gasps took a toll on his broken body, and he sobbed between breaths. Fresh blood began to pool on the ground.

He made a sound that Lance didn't quite catch as Lance struggled to position the Blade of Marmora apprentice's head in his lap. 

"Hey, hey, hey, you're gonna be okay," Lance tried to comfort. 

"'m sorry," Keith choked.

Lance coughed out a gasp in disbelief. He felt blurry. "What? Why?"

"I'm sor-" Keith rasped again. "You're... stuck with me. Here."

Before Lance's open mouth could say anything, Keith continued. "Inconvenience. You hate me." He sounded lifeless, defeated. 

"I don't hate you," Lance cried. "Keith, no. What makes you think that?" He absentmindedly stroked Keith's hair. Could the rest of the paladins still hear him? Could they hear Keith now, too?

"Yes you do." Keith quietly whimpered again as a breath hitched in his throat. "I'm sorry, I-"

" _I'm_ sorry," Lance cut him off. "I'm so sorry, Keith. I didn't mean to hurt you. I never wanted to see you hurt. I hate seeing you like this. I'm the one who should be apologising."

Keith's head nodded to the side, out of his control. He was losing his fight. His right arm lay helpless on the ground and his eyes struggled to focus on Lance. 

"'m sor...." Keith tried one last time. Tears flooded from his eyes but he was quiet. 

"You're important, Keith." Lance continued to stroke his hair with one hand and grabbed Keith's closest wrist with the other. "You're so, so important. To the universe. To your friends. To Shiro. To me." 

Keith managed to nod his head. "We're... -aving a... bonding moment," he whispered. Blood endlessly seeped through the Marmoran suit. His limbs felt heavy and he let his eyes slip closed. Lance jostled him and Keith made another pained noise. He had to stay awake.

"I never hated you."

Keith opened his eyes. He couldn't move anymore, couldn't speak, but he looked at Lance in understanding. 

"I never hated you." 

Lance cried.

The Black Lion landed loudly and Shiro burst from the opening before the jaw had opened completely. Blood trailed from his hairline and nose, his helmet nowhere to be seen. Lance let Shiro pull Keith into his arms, cradling him, desperate to hold on. He listened as Shiro spoke to Keith, heard Keith's unmistakable efforts to respond but failing over and over, heard the fear in Shiro's voice. He watched Shiro dip his forehead to meet Keith's, saw the way he effortlessly held the back of Keith's skull, as if it was a natural, perfect fit. 

"Looks... like Earth," Keith breathed out before darkness engulfed him completely. 

And Lance embraced him for the first time in days as Keith fell from the cryopod, his recovering body small, pale, and weak, but whole and healed. No, he never hated him. 


End file.
